Google’s plans to expand its Dublin datacenter presence have been derailed by Irish county officials who say the project isn’t sustainable enough.
The decision, issued last week but previously unreported, saw the South Dublin County Council deny Google’s ten-year planning permit to build a 72,400 square meter data storage facility, along with associated support infrastructure, at the Grange Castle Business Park outside the Irish capital.
Reasons given for denying the project centered on environmental impact. The council states Google “failed to demonstrate that the proposed use is acceptable” due to insufficient power capacity on the national grid, and a “lack of significant on site renewable energy,” which it classified as anything “below 100 percent.”
The council also cites a “lack of clarity” on Google’s current Power Purchase Agreements in Ireland was also cited, as well as a lack of connection to the nearby district heating network and too few details about “how the proposal will impact power supply once operational” in 2027.
To bring the objections home, the council said Google’s proposal didn’t comply with local rules related to “retention and protection of existing green infrastructure … provision of green infrastructure, and complying with the [council’s] Green Space Factor.”
In short, Google’s nowhere green enough to build another massive datacenter on the Emerald Isle, where it already has several facilities.
A letter [PDF] in support of the council’s decision from the Irish National Trust suggests the new Google facility, if completed as proposed, would result in an additional 224,250 tons of CO2 equivalent emitted in Ireland annually – equivalent to 0.44 percent of the country’s total CO2 emissions.
“An increase of .44 percent in national emissions is entirely incompatible with our obligations to reduce emissions,” Irish National Trust planning officer Seán O’Callaghan wrote in a letter to the council earlier this month. O’Callaghan further noted that datacenter construction in Ireland has already gone overboard, and needs to be checked.
“Proliferation of data infrastructure has largely gone unchecked, and datacenters now consume 21 percent of Ireland’s total metered electricity,” O’Callaghan said. “This is up from 5 percent in 2015 and represents more electricity use than all urban households in Ireland combined.”
We’ve reached out to Google to learn if it plans to appeal the decision, but haven’t heard back yet.
Google, which claims it is working to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, recently admitted that it’s been doing the opposite, and has seen its emissions increase 48 percent since 2019. Google has blamed its increased consumption on the growth of its datacenter network, which is being expanded largely to meet the growing demands of AI.
It’s not clear to what extent the tech giant has bothered to consider its alternatives, given Microsoft managed to get approval to build a new datacenter at Grange Castle – the same site where Google was just shot down – in July 2023.
To meet Ireland’s concerns about energy use at its proposed datacenter, Microsoft simply opted to build its own power plant to act as a backup so it doesn’t drain too much from the national grid. Microsoft’s bit barn power plant will run on natural gas. Therefore, making any claim the Windows maker won its approval based on its environmental bonafides unlikely.
We’ve reached out to the South Dublin County Council to learn more about the differences between the two projects, but didn’t immediately hear back. ®